The one who did the nude sharing a picnic with two blokes in suits? I like a nice bit of smut. It's art, you philistine. It's in a gallery. And that was Edouard Manet with an A. Claude Monet with an O was the leading French impressionist.

Now, that's versatility. One minute you're waving a brush around, the next you're pretending to be Frank Spencer. Not that kind of impressionist.

"Ooh, Betty, le chat a fait un whoopsie dans mon beret!" No, the kind of impressionist who painted hazy pictures of lily ponds and rivers, aiming to catch the feel of a scene rather than the detail. The movement got its name from Monet's 1872 work Impression, Sunrise.

Oh, that impressionism. I've got one of their chocolate boxes. That's a cheap joke. Are you French yourself?

Quoi? Our friends across the channel have traditionally been sniffy about Monet and his gang. They thought he was only good enough for foreigners.

And that's changing? There must be some reason we're talking about him. Next week Paris hosts France's first major Monet exhibition for 30 years. It's the biggest the world has ever seen and has already sold 38,000 tickets.

Le fils prodigue est de retour? Sort of. Slightly embarrassingly for the locals, the show might never have happened without overseas input, from the paintings that have been loaned, to the exhibition's British co-curator. As one French museum boss put it, "The Anglo-Saxons have written everything on Monet for the past 30 years."

I feel another impression coming on. Not Frank Spencer again!

Eric Morecambe. Not only does it have a hilarious French punchline; I'll even let you deliver it. Go on then.

What do you think of the show so far? Rosbif!

Do say: "He makes you look at the world in a whole new way."

Don't say: "Am I wearing your bifocals?"

• This article was amended on 14 September 2010. The original referred to Monet's work Impression, Sunlight. This has been corrected.